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22 de nov. 2018

Article by Quim Torra "Language and the Beasts". False controversy

Anti-Catalan media and even political leaders pounced on an article, written by the President of Catalonia years before he entered the world of polítics, twisting the content to portray him as a racist and a supremacist. Here is an English translation: judge for yourselves!

Language and the beasts

"They are here, amongst us. They repudiate any expression of Catalan-ness. It's a sickly phobia"

by Quim Torra 12/19/2012

In my parents' house there was an old copy of a book that all my brothers had read: "About when beasts spoke", by Manuel Folch i Torres. My father was inflexible and, just as Thackeray's The Rose and the Ring and Josep Maria Folch i Torres' Bolavà, held that one could not grow up without having read them. It was a delightful book in which owls, bears, elephants, deer and bumblebees spoke, a collection of fables for children's education. Now when you look at your country you see beasts talking again. But they are of another type. Snakes, vipers, hyenas. Beasts, though, in human form, that those up hatred. A hatred - outraged, nauseated, like copper-green -, against everything that the Catalan language stands for. They are here, amongst us. They repudiate any expression of Catalan-ness. It's a sickly phobia. There is something Freudian about these beasts. Or a small glitch in their DNA chain. Poor individuals! They live in a country of which they know nothing: its culture, its traditions, its history. They deaf and blind to anything that smells Catalan to them. It brings them out in spots. They spurn everything that is not Spanish and in Spanish. They have names and surnames, these beasts do. We all know one. These beasts abound. They live, die and multiply. One of them was responsible the other day for an incident that has not reached Catalonia and deserves to be explained, as an outstanding example of the bestiality of these beings. Poor beasts, it's all they're capable of. One of the few airlines that accepts Catalan with normality is Swiss. If you have taken any of their flights to the ancient Confederation, you will have found how they use our language when it comes to taking off or landing the craft. This is an exception, for unfortunately, the rest of the companies still treat us exactly as what we are, the last colony in Europe. Well, a couple of weeks ago one of these beasts travelled on a Swiss flight. On arriving at the destination, the usual observations prior to the landing were announced in Catalan. The beast, automatically, secreted his angry spittle. The stench of a sewer left his seat. He moved, restless, desperate, horrified at having to hear four words in Catalan. He had no escape. A mucous sweat, like a toad with a cold, dripped down from his armpits. You have to imagine the beast, after such a long time - they can live in their Spanish world without any problems -, listening to four words in a language they hate. Outraged, he decided to write a letter to a German newspaper in Zurich, complaining about the treatment he had received because "his rights were violated" as Spanish was the "first" official language of Spain. And the complaint of the beast was published, splashed across the page. Thank goodness, our good friends of the Casal Català of Zurich responded and left clear things (so many embassies and Sea Consulates and look, a small Catalan club is the one who has mobilized thanks to the decency and dignity of his members). But why do we have to mobilize each time? When will the beasts' attacks end? How can we endure, in 2008, so much anguish, so much humiliation and contempt?